


The Bitter End

by manic_intent



Series: Eminent Domain [2]
Category: John Wick (Movies)
Genre: Being kidnapped isn't fun but it's worse when your kidnappers feed you McDonalds, Kidnapping, M/M, That arranged marriage AU one year on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 12:09:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,149
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11668848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manic_intent/pseuds/manic_intent
Summary: Santino glanced up when the door opened, relaxing when he recognised the pale, skinny cop. The scared one. Ratty suit, bad tie. The cop edged over to the table and set down a crumpled paper bag. “Dinner.”“McDonalds? Are you people trying to poison me?”“Uh. Wait. You’re allergic, or…?”“Everyone’s allergic to that kind of shit.”“Oh, I see how it is.” The cop looked resigned. “Kid—”“Santino. That’s my name. Yours?”“Uh.” The cop hesitated, then he exhaled. “Jimmy. Look, uh, Santino. Just behave and you won’t get hurt. All right?”





	The Bitter End

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt 6: John is forced to intervene when Santino is kidnapped.
> 
> The original prompt mentioned “rivals kidnap Santino” but Camorristi don’t kidnap rivals, they just murder them outright, sometimes in broad daylight on the street. So here is something a little different. Continuation from Eminent Domain.

Detective Jimmy Sadoski was fairly sure that his partner had just gone off the deep bend. Completely fucking cuckoo. With all the bells and whistles. They’d just nabbed a goddamned _kid_ off some fancy uni campus. Shoved him into an unmarked car and driven off. 

And instead of getting him booked and processed, they were in some sort of… of derelict _house_ that reminded Jimmy uncomfortably of one of those movie set crime scenes. Walls dank with mildew, windows cloudy and boarded up, quiet neighborhood, middle of buttfuck nowhere. 

This was not how Jimmy had thought his day was going to go when he’d woken up in the morning. 

“Relax,” Rusty growled. “You’re making me dizzy, pacing around like that.” 

Detective Russell ‘Rusty’ Harrelson was slouched in a rotten old armchair, smoking. The cigarette smoke had thickened in the room, turning the air ashy. He was a tall, lean man with terse hair, cold eyes set deep in a craggy face. As a beat cop, he’d once been a legend. Jimmy’s late father, never usually one for praising anyone, had only had "good man" to say when Jimmy had been assigned to Rusty. At first he’d thought maybe it had been a favour, having a retired cop’s son pushed on a famous veteran. Now, he wasn’t so sure. 

“I thought you said we were going after the people who killed your daughter,” Jimmy hissed.

“We are. This is step one.”

“A _kid_ is step one?” 

“Told you. He’s not just a kid.” Rusty glanced over at the way down into the cellar. The kid was locked in a room down there. 

“You said he’s some… some kinda mafia don’s son or something, right?” Jimmy ran his hand shakily through his hair, under his cap. 

Rusty took a long drag of his cigarette, then breathed out. “There’s a second world. Runs alongside this one like a leech. Crimes you see on the street, they’re nothing. Offal. The shit that goes down in the second world is the real deal. The big money. Drugs, guns, counterfeit goods, people… whatever you want. The real ‘free market’.” 

His partner was losing it. “Yeah? And?” 

“Thing is. People are people. There’s still got to be structures. Rules. Decades back, things got real ugly. War between the worlds. So there was a pact. The second world made a deal with this one. They’d keep their shit under control and we pretend they don’t exist.”

Jimmy laughed. “Seriously? Just like that? Just let crime happen?” He paused. “You’re serious.” 

“You ever been to Naples?”

“No?” That was a weird non-sequitur.

“You got a view of crime as something that can be controlled and put down ‘cos you’re a New York boy. Born and bred. Even with all the shit that happens everyday on these streets, you believe that deep down, you’re one of the good guys. And the good guys always win.” Rusty breathed out another cloud of smoke. “Naples. The cops that handle the mafia, they’re soldiers and they know it. It’s a war out there, in the open. When I was having a coffee at a cafe, I saw a kid walk up to a door. He knocked on it. Some lady opened up. Scooter quickly came by. Blam! Right in the face.”

Jimmy flinched violently. “Shit!”

Rusty laughed. “Yeah. Could say that. Nobody gave a shit. The Italian police came through. Body bags, the works. People just kept on their business. Tracking through the blood. An hour in, they hosed everything down. Turns out she was the mother of some rival clan that’d gotten too big for its boots.” 

“So if there’s this second world? Why did she die?” 

Rusty shrugged. “‘Cos she was part of it. But nobody shot anybody else. People knew they were safe. Even those who just walked through the blood. See? Law and fucking order. Now this other world. It’s got twelve kings. One for each fucking type of big shot organisation. They call it the High Table. Cosa Nostra. Bratva. Triad. Yakuza. 'Ndràngheta. Cartel. Turkish conglomerate. Albanian mafia. The British Firm. Black Flag. Indian Company. And the Camorra.” Rusty did another drag. “Yeah. That kid’s a mafia don’s son. Not just any don. Son of the man representing the Camorra.” 

The air felt like it was briefly sucked out of the room. “Ah hell. Rusty…” Jimmy trailed off. “You’re not joking.”

“Nope.” Rusty chuckled. It was a dead man’s laugh, a ghoulish rattle. “I know it's hard to believe. When I was digging all this shit up the last few months, I thought I was going crazy too, sometimes. But. Think about it. He look scared to you at all? When we bagged him?”

The kid had laughed. Jimmy had been too shocked and nervous to say anything at the time. Now, thinking back, that had actually been creepy as hell. “That’s why we’re not at the precinct? Doing this by the book?”

Rusty eyed Jimmy flatly. “You told me you wanted to help me get to Jessica’s murderer.” 

“Yeah. ‘Course. You think that kid did it?”

“Nope. Wasn’t him. Wasn’t his family, either.” 

“So… what then?” Jimmy asked, appalled. “If he had nothing to do with it? Why did we grab him?” 

“Didn’t tell you how she died.” Rusty said, pensive. “She was an addict. Whatever she could get high on, she’d get high on. I tried to get her clean. It’d work for a bit, then she’d fall back into bad habits. Over and over.”

Jimmy nodded cautiously. He’d known this. Everyone in the precinct did. It was why Rusty’s daughter’s death had been marked as death by misadventure. Shorthand for an overdose. Or, in Jessica's case, a death that had come when she'd been too out of her mind to run. At least she’d been effectively out for the count when the fire had started. 

“Albanian mafia were testing this new drug,” Rusty said. “The mafias do it the same way. Guinea pigs are easy to find. They just put the word out. Free drugs, come and get it. Addicts come in, get funnelled somewhere, shoot up on the new shit. The pushers watch to see what happens. The pigs die, well fuck, maybe the dosage needs to be less pure. Dead customers mean no more profit. That night. Jessica went for a free dose. Turns out she rolled the dice right. According to the autopsy. Good dreams.” 

“And then?” Jimmy asked softly, when Rusty trailed off into silence. 

“There was a shootout. Turns out the Albanians muscled in where they shouldn’t have. On the Russians. Tarasov bratva retaliated. Meth lab in the building exploded in the fighting.” Rusty clapped his hands together sharply, making Jimmy flinch. “And that was that.”

“So who are we after?” Jimmy said uncomfortably. “Albanian mafia?” 

“Nah. The ones in the building already got what was coming. The Russians are thorough.” Rusty shook his head. “The man they sent, though. The hitman. Russians call him the Baba Yaga. Real scary piece of work.” Rusty grinned. “Seems even the High Table’s afraid of him.” 

Jimmy was even more lost. “So you want to… blackmail that kid’s father? Into dealing with this hitman?” 

Rusty laughed. “Nothing so complicated.” He drew an envelope out from his jacket, tossing it to Jimmy. It was heavy. Inside were a few photographs, high resolution, printed on glossy paper. The kid in a park, having ice cream, laughing. In an arcade, at a Time Crisis machine. Next to the Hudson, kissing. In each picture his companion was the same. A tall man with dark hair and uneven sideburns. 

“Funny thing about life,” Rusty said, taking another drag. “Looks like even monsters can fall in love.” He breathed out, another gritty lungful of smoke. “Go take a walk, Jimmy. Buy us some dinner. Use cash. No cards.”

#

Santino glanced up when the door opened, relaxing when he recognised the pale, skinny cop. The scared one. Ratty suit, bad tie. The cop edged over to the table and set down a crumpled paper bag. “Dinner.”

“McDonalds? Are you people trying to poison me?”

“Uh. Wait. You’re allergic, or…?” 

“Everyone’s allergic to that kind of shit.” 

“Oh, I see how it is.” The cop looked resigned. “Kid—”

“Santino. That’s my name. Yours?” 

“Uh.” The cop hesitated, then he exhaled. “Jimmy. Look, uh, Santino. Just behave and you won’t get hurt. All right?” 

Santino rolled his eyes. “You should be worried about yourself. Have you been shot before?”

“Uh, can’t say I have.” 

“Some people say that if they die, they don’t want to be shot in the face. But if you get shot in the face, it’s instant. You die. If you get shot in the chest, it takes five, ten minutes. Maybe more. Your lungs fill up. You drown, in pain.” Santino smiled, baring his teeth. “Head, or chest? I’d pray if I were you.” 

Jimmy shuddered. “Jesus, you’re a creepy kid. Just… eat. Okay?” 

Santino rattled his wrists pointedly. He was still shackled to the chair. Jimmy grimaced, circling around. “Right. I’ll free your hands. But any funny business and my partner’s outside. He’ll shoot you down.” 

“You think I’ll run?” Santino asked, as disdainfully as he could. “I’m not going to run.”

“You’re… confident.”

“If the two of you wanted to kill me I would be dead. If this was a police matter you would have taken me to the precinct. So you want me for something. A ransom? My family will pay. Whatever figure you care to name. But the two of you won’t survive to enjoy it for long.” 

“It’s not like that.” Jimmy unlocked Santino’s wrists. He pulled up a spare, rusty chair to the opposite side of the fold-up table, and glanced behind him at the open door. The room beyond was a dark, empty cellar, with a faint glow beyond from a stairway up. 

“Then?” Santino investigated the bag, expecting the worst. Cold chips and a Big Mac. He pulled a face. 

“It’s not going to kill you,” Jimmy said. 

“That’s what you think.” 

“You haven’t had McDonalds before? C’mon.”

“First time for everything.” Santino took a bite. Ugh.

“Seriously? You’ve never eaten a Big Mac?” Jimmy was genuinely surprised. Santino ignored him, eating quickly and choking it down with the cup of coke. Worst dinner of his life. Including some of John’s early attempts at cooking.

“Right,” Jimmy said, lowering his voice, once Santino had finished eating. “I’m going to try talking to my partner again. I think this is all a big mistake. If we let you go somewhere, no foul, right?”

“Where?”

“Somewhere public. Subway station, maybe. I’ll give you some money for a phone.” 

“All right,” Santino conceded. That could work. “No foul.”

“Okay.” Jimmy sagged in relief. “I’ll give it a shot.”

“So if it’s not money you want, what is it? A favour? Information? Your partner must be desperate.” Santino paused. “But calling me out of class like that, using one of my tutors? Smart. Bypassed my security detail.” Security didn’t linger within the school buildings, and Santino hadn’t thought to notify his retainers when he had been called out to another section to talk to a tutor. Stupid mistake. 

“Not a favour.” Jimmy cleared his throat. “Uh. Sounds like you’re. Married? To someone pretty dangerous? You’re kinda young. Was that even legal?”

“What.” This was about _John_? 

Jimmy forged on. “‘Cos, you know, yeah, child marriage is gross but still kinda legal in these parts and—”

“I’m not _that_ young, God. You guys kidnapped me from college, not high school.” 

“People are kinda most at risk of getting married at seventeen and—”

“I was older than that. Okay?” Santino frowned at him. “The hell do you care?” This conversation wasn’t going the way he thought it would.

“Course I care.” Jimmy took in a deep breath. “I’ve been a detective for a few years. Seen all kinds of shit. Domestics, too. People married to violent people. Uhh. There’s a helpline.”

“Is there a point to this?” 

“Rusty—my partner—said everyone’s scared of this guy. John Wick.”

“Not me.” He had nothing to be scared of. The year with John had convinced him of that. Strange and intense as John could be at times, he had been nothing but kind. Gentle, even. _That_ had also not gone the way Santino had thought it would. “So Rusty has a problem with John. A grudge?”

Jimmy nodded uncomfortably. “Daughter. Died. She was a drug addict. Building burned down. Your uh, your husband was apparently fighting Albanian mafia and stuff caught fire.” 

“Ah.” 

“You don’t look surprised.”

“I know what he does.” That changed things. Santino had seen the grim face of the other, older cop, its resolve. He’d thought it’d just had something to do with money. If it was a blood feud, well. That was complicated. 

“You don’t look sorry about it either.”

“I’m not the reason she died.” Santino leaned back in his chair. “She was in the building. A guinea pig?” 

“Yeah.”

Santino shrugged. “Then she would have died sooner or later.”

Jimmy stared at him, expressionless. Then he shook his head, pushing away from the table in disgust. “You know what? Fuck this. Maybe you and Rusty deserve each other. I’m out of here.”

“You think that’s it?” Santino asked mockingly. “That you can walk away? You’d better hope that my family gets here before John. They might be kinder. But either way. I suggest you make your peace with God.” 

Jimmy slammed the door shut. Santino waited, listening for the footsteps to fade. Then he rubbed his wrists, allowing himself a smirk. The cop _was_ new at this. He’d forgotten to cuff Santino back to the chair.

#

Rusty had shrugged when Jimmy announced he wanted to sleep in a motel and not in a derelict house. That had been easy. Jimmy took the car. Rusty hadn’t cared about that either. He coasted out for a while, driving to nowhere, passing motels. Then he pulled over to the side of the road, leaning his forehead against the wheel. “Fuck!”

He couldn’t leave Rusty to his stupidity. Or that goddamned kid. Jimmy turned the car around, stepping on the accelerator. On the drive back, he revised strategies in his head. Ways of getting Rusty to see reason. They could still turn the kid in. Something like that. Or get this John Wick person to turn himself in. In exchange for the kid’s freedom. That would work. Yeah. Somewhat more confident, turning up the winding, dark road that would lead to the abandoned houses, Jimmy nearly drove right past the kid.

Santino blinked even as Jimmy gaped at him, openmouthed. “The fuck are you doing out here?” Jimmy said, blinking. “Rusty let you out?”

“Some idiot forgot to cuff me back to the chair and the room had a ventilation window.”

“… You know,” Jimmy said slowly, “normal people probably would’ve thought to lie. If you’d said that Rusty let you go I would’ve believed you. While you had to go right out and be a dick.” The kid shrugged. “So where do you even think you’re going? Long walk to the closest phone. And it’s pretty dark.” 

“Your point being?”

“Okay, wiseass,” Jimmy said, tired now. “Get in the car.” 

“Why?”

“Don’t make me get out of the car and chase you down, kid.” 

“You’re not that much older than me,” Santino said, scowling, then he yelped at the sudden roar of an explosion. In the distance, a balloon of orange fire, belching upwards. 

What the hell?

“That’s from the direction of the house.” Shit! “The hell did it… what happened? Your people?” 

“Grenades don’t make a blast like that.” Santino narrowed his eyes, his jaw set. “Your partner. Wired the house to blow?” 

“I… he…” That made a certain sort of horrible sense. Jessica had been blown up, burned to death. Was this Rusty’s revenge? To blow the house up? Die along with the man who had killed his daughter? “Fuck. Fucking hell.” He tried to call Rusty. No answer. No answer again. And again.

Santino stared at the orange glow. He was pale, leaning against the car, breathing shallowly. Then he shook himself, chewing on his lower lip, and got into the car. Jimmy stared at him numbly. They watched the fire for a while in silence. Then Jimmy exhaled, rubbing a shaky hand over his eyes. “Okay, kid. I guess. I’ll take you home.” 

“I’m not a kid.” Santino squeezed his eyes shut, then he gave Jimmy an address.

Santino lived in a large house with a sprawling set of grounds. There was a security checkpoint, all of whom looked surprised when Santino stuck his head out of the window, but they let them pass after Santino spoke to them in Italian. Jimmy pulled up outside the house, his hands clenched on the wheel. Santino stared at him for a moment, then he got out. _No foul?_ Jimmy wanted to ask, but the kid looked visibly shaken. Then he understood. John Wick was probably dead. Funny. Even mafia kids could mourn.

“You uh. Going to be okay?” Jimmy asked uncomfortably. He didn’t know what else to say.

Santino glared at him, hands clenched. He let out his breath in a tight exhale. Then he stuffed his hands into his pockets. “Do you play Halo?”

The question was so out of the blue that Jimmy answered truthfully. “Some? I’m not that good at it though.”

“Come on in.” 

The large house was also empty. Designer furniture, a lot of it impersonal. There was a photo frame nudged beside the tv, a picture of Santino knee-deep in snow, about to throw a snowball at the camera. Santino turned on the tv and passed Jimmy a controller. They started a mission, at a point halfway through the game. At one point the phone rang, and Santino paused the game, padding off towards the dining room. Jimmy could hear him talking in Italian. When he returned, he was a little red-eyed, but he sat down without a word and unpaused the game. They got past a level. Santino was pretty good, but Jimmy wasn’t really embarrassing himself.

Another level. The door opened. Santino turned, flushing with anger, about to snap at whomever was walking in, then he scrambled to his feet. It was the man in the photographs. John Wick was imposing in the flesh, especially like this, his clothes singed, face smeared with soot and flecked with scabbing cuts. He had a hand clenched tight over a pistol, and his eyes flicked from Santino to Jimmy with an awful sort of focused intensity. 

“John? You’re _alive_.” Santino approached, breaking into a brilliant smile. John gently but firmly started to push Santino behind him, raising his gun at Jimmy. “John!” Santino grabbed John’s wrist, trying ineffectively to push it down. “He’s not a threat. He brought me home. John. Listen to me.” 

The Baba Yaga. What stared at Jimmy over Santino’s shoulder had no malice to it. Only an implacable fury. Death itself could not be so easily dissuaded. Jimmy got slowly to his feet, hands up. Head, or chest? He wished that he had prayed. 

“ _John_ ,” Santino snapped, and leaned up, kissing John hard on the mouth. John stiffened, his aim wavering. For a moment he didn’t respond, still as stone. Then he leaned into the kiss with a low animal sound, the muzzle of the gun dropping to the floor. Santino stroked his cheek with his spare hand, but kept one hand on his wrist. When they broke briefly for air, Santino growled, “What are you waiting for, Detective? Fuck off.” 

Jimmy slunk away quickly, expecting to get shot in the back at any minute. He exhaled loudly when he was in the car, his hands trembling so much he could barely get a grip on the wheel. The car started up, and Jimmy drove out of the compound in a daze. He was going to have to tell the precinct something about Rusty.

“You poor bastard,” Jimmy whispered. “Should’ve left things the hell alone.”

#

The gun was left on the floor with the game controllers. John was passive as he let Santino pull him upstairs. Sleepwalking, almost. As though the anger that had cooled had left instead only a deadened stillness. _Find a way to put me down_ , John had said. Santino shivered. There was something that was still not quite right. Something dangerous. But he was not afraid. He had never been afraid of John.

John resisted when Santino tried to pull them towards the bathroom, tugging him to the bed instead. They kicked off shoes. Santino was about to say something when John pressed him to the bed to kiss him, again with that ugly sound, like the gasps of a wounded creature. Santino nipped him but John ignored him, kissing him roughly, his hands running feverishly over Santino’s arms, his cheeks and throat, none too gently. “Hey,” Santino growled, panting for breath. He jerked his head to the side when John tried to kiss him again. “John.” 

John closed his eyes, his head bowed. His hands dug briefly into the sheets. “I’m alive.” Santino nuzzled John’s cheek, petting his shoulders. “I’m really here.”

“He said you were in the basement.” John’s mouth was against his ear, his voice nearly inaudible. “He had your bag.” 

“I got myself out. If you’d driven up from the main road you’d probably have passed me on the way up.” 

“Went the other way.” John’s shoulders shook under Santino’s hands. “Been tracking you all day. Thought I’d be too late.” 

“I took care of things myself. John.” Santino tugged up his chin, looking into uncomfortably blank eyes. “I. Took. Care of it. So.” He kissed John hard on the lips, close-mouthed. “Come back to me.” 

John made another ugly, animal sound. Then he shifted down in urgent jerks, his fingers rough on Santino’s belt, tossing it aside. He navigated the zipper, then pulled pants and underwear down, just enough to get a hand on Santino’s cock. Santino bit down on his yelp—too dry, too rough—and John was swallowing him down, tongue pressed hard against flesh. Santino moaned, clutching at John’s hair, the singed clothes, stiffening up quickly in the heat of John’s mouth. 

He tried to buck, but John pinned him down with an arm over his belly, breathing hard through his nose. John sucked once Santino was hard, nose buried against coarse curls, not bothering to have a rhythm, as though he just wanted to put his throat through the abuse, to get as much as Santino into his mouth as possible. Santino cursed, his heels pushing against the sheets, against John’s back, then he was shouting, arching. John drank him down, only choking once. He let up with a cough, breathing hard. Then he sucked him down again. Santino whined. It was too soon, flesh too sensitive for this to be good. 

“John!” Santino curled fingers against John’s cheek. “John, stop. It hurts. _John_.” John stiffened, though he let up, reluctant, his cheek pressed to Santino’s thigh, breathing unsteadily. His eyes were squeezed shut. Eventually, when the thorny ache subsided, Santino pressed a hand tentatively against John’s temple, and watched as John rubbed his cheek against his palm. When Santino pulled him down again, he went gratefully. 

John was quiet later in the shower, but at least the blankness in his eyes was gone. He was tactile instead, the way he usually wasn’t, nuzzling any patch of skin he could get his mouth on. They curled together on a dry part of the bed. John closed his eyes, but he wasn’t sleeping. 

“I have an idea about that cop,” Santino said. John made no sound. “It’ll be good to have some sort of liaison. Between this world and theirs. I’ll have to talk to my father.”

“That other cop. He said I killed his daughter.”

Santino glanced up, but John’s eyes were still closed. “Did you?”

“Don’t remember.” 

“There was a job you did. Against the Albanians. A meth lab blew up. Collateral damage.” 

“That’s what it is? Collateral damage?” 

Santino wasn’t sure what to say to that. He couldn’t say that it was an accident, because it wasn’t. If John hadn’t attacked, the building probably wouldn’t have blown up. The girl would have lived to die another day. “You chose this life a long time ago,” he said finally. 

“And there’s no way out.”

Was that a question? “Not for you. Or me.” 

John didn’t reply. He was breathing slowly, one palm stroking uneven circles over Santino’s ribs, his flank, his belly. Then he nudged his mouth over the back of Santino’s neck, settling down to sleep. Santino lay still, listening to John’s heart beating, lulled into uneasy dreams.

**Author's Note:**

> Despite progress, child marriage is still legal in all 50 states: https://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/07/26/despite-progress-child-marriage-is-still-legal-in-all-50-states/
> 
> There was a study a while ago where apparently 1 in 5 millennials have never eaten a big mac, and I am one of them XD;; http://www.avclub.com/article/only-1-5-millennials-have-tried-big-mac-243793
> 
> \--  
> twitter: manic_intent  
> tumblr: manic-intent


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